Google to join Wednesday's anti-SOPA protest
No blackout, though other website shutdowns multiply
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Updated Google will join Wednesday's anti-SOPA and anti–PROTECT IP Act (aka PIPA) protest by noting its opposition to the bills on its home page.
"Like many businesses, entrepreneurs and web users, we oppose these bills because there are smart, targeted ways to shut down foreign rogue websites without asking American companies to censor the internet," a Google spokeswoman told The Reg in an email. "So tomorrow we will be joining many other tech companies to highlight this issue on our US home page."
Google did not immediately answer our follow-up question as to whether it plans to show its displeasure by displaying a Google Doodle logo targeting the anti–online piracy bills, but Cnet claims that no such logo rework is in the works.
On Monday, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales announced that it would shut down its English-language site for a full 24 hours on Wednesday in protest of what many observers identify as vastly over-reaching legislation.
Last Tuesday, Reddit got the online protest rolling with their announcement of a 12-hour Wednesday shutdown. Tucows signed on on Thursday, and Boing Boing joined the shutdown cadre on Saturday.
Other sites that have announced plans to go dark in protest include the Internet Archive, the Tor Project, openSUSE, XDA Developers, the Center for Democracy & Technology, Greenpeace International, and many more.
Even ICanHasCheezburger and its entire network of unbridled cuteness are shutting down in protest.
Note to SOPA supporters Lamar Smith (R-TX), John Conyers (D-MI), Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), and Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), among others: when even Ceiling Cat, Dr. Tinycat, and Hovercat are ticked off at you, perhaps you're scratching in the wrong litter box.
Perhaps those pro-SOPA members of the US House of Representatives have no fear of Google searches for their websites coming up empty. Inadvertently, unintentionally, and accidentally, of course... ®
Update
Never one to let a meme go to waste, YouTube has turned up this little gem: "The day the LOLCats died," to the tune of Don McLean's "American Pie". The Reg applauds the creator's skills, even if some of the wording is a bit labored, but notes that nothing can beat CERN scientist AlpineKat and her "Large Hadron Rap," featuring guest vocals from Stephen Hawking (possibly.)
COMMENTS
When the US movie industry...
...is using a treaty - created to facilitate extradition of terrorist suspects - to extradite a student for doing something which is not even proved to be illegal in the UK (and he wasn't even hosting it in the USA), there is something very, very wrong.
Facebook should shut down - a luxury it will not have once it goes public. 200 million FB zombies without their fix could bring the economy to a screeching halt.
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